India is justly famous for its chai – known in Starbucksland by the just-in-case-you-didn’t-get-it-the-first-time, Babelicly echoful moniker “Chai Tea Latte” – but in South India, coffee rules the streets. It is both repast and entertainment, as coffee-wallahs (how do you say “barista” in Tamil?) serve “meter-long coffee,” so called because the dense shot of “filter coffee” and sugary boiled milk are mixed cup-to-cup at full arms’ length. (Not all practitioners achieve the dramatic lengths depicted in my photo, above.)

It is 8:00 am at the Indian Coffee House. Breakfast time. Yoo-Mi and I have taken a table in the “Ladies and Families” room, and are sipping fresh lime juice while we wait for our food. Shortly after we sit down, a woman takes the table next to us and orders a coffee. Though the clientele of the ICH is as class-diverse as just about any eating establishment I can think of in India, the woman is more shabbily dressed and unkempt than anyone I have ever seen there. She is barefoot, her saree is not clean, and her hair is just beginning to regrow after a recent shaving. Whether she has been widowed or had a ritual shave at a temple like Thirupathi, we cannot know. Her demeanor is deeply introspective and transparently sad. The waiter brings her an extra-full cup, setting it before her with a gentleness possibly never-before witnessed at ICH. It is as if to say he wishes he could do more for her.Continue reading ‘A Cup of Coffee’

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